makes her not the less careful to improve.

I am not so presumptuous to imagine that my _English_ can do sufficient
Justice to the sense of this admir'd AUTHOR; and, therefore, have caused
the ORIGINAL to be placed against it Page for Page, hoping that, both
together, may prove an agreeable and useful Entertainment.----But I have
detain'd you too long already, and shall only add, that I am, with much
respect, and every good Wish, MADAM, _Your most Obedient Humble
Servant_, THE TRANSLATOR.


The _Precieuses Ridicules_ have been partly imitated in "_The
Damoiselles a la Mode_, Compos'd and Written by Richard Flecknoe.
London: Printed for the Author, 1667. To their graces the Duke and
Duchess of Newcastle, the Author dedicates this his comedy more humbly
than by way of epistle." This gentleman, who was "so distinguished as a
wretched poet, that his name had almost become proverbial," and who gave
the title to Dryden's _Mac-Flecknoe_, is said to have been originally a
Jesuit. Langbaine states "that his acquaintance with the nobility was
more than with the Muses." In the preface our author says: "This Comedy
is taken out of several excellent pieces of _Moliere_. The main plot out
of his _Pretieusee's Ridiculee's_; the Counterplot of _Sganarelle_ out
of his _Escole des Femmes_, and out of the _Escole des Marys_, the two
_Naturals_; all which, like so many _Pretieuse_ stones, I have brought
out of _France_; and as a Lapidary set in one Jewel to adorn our English
stage."

This motley play was never acted; at least the author says: "for the
Acting it, those who have the Governing of the Stage, have their
Humours, and wou'd be intreated; and I have mine and won't intreat them;